“You are about to embark on a great crusade” to free the oppressed in Europe, and so it began. My father served in WWII as a tech sergeant with the First Army, mainly tasked with knowing where the First Army munition supplies were located, finding out where they were needed and seeing that they were deployed accordingly. Having completed one year of college, I guess they thought he was a expendable grunt that could be deployed in the field, but handle the responsibility of munitions tracking and movement. He was barely 19 years old when he landed on Omaha Beach as part of the Normandy invasion. Thank God he was not in the first wave. I remain in awe of my father and believe it was a miracle he survived the war. He vividly recalled the beach littered with bodies, both the sand and the ocean being colored by streams of blood. He was sickened that the waves of men had died so the many like him could continue onward. At the time my father landed, the Germans were still less than 1 mile inland. My parents, my wife and I returned to the Normandy beaches for the 50th anniversary of the invasion in June of 1994. It was very tough on my father, especially visiting the cemetery at Omaha Beach. But he was a survivor. I’ll never forget driving on the narrow roads along the coast and hearing his recollections of events after the landings. Going into St. Lo, where he said the city was completely destroyed by allied bombing and you could not get away from the smell of death as bodies were rotting in the rubble. The recollection of that smell never left his memory as he unfortunately experienced this over and over. From St. Lo, and the hedgerows, he experienced the horror of the Falaise Gap. More bodies littered everywhere as the Germans were decimated trying to make their escape, and the smell. As we eventually made it into Paris, he remembered being treated as a much needed liberator and then recalled finding the exact spot on the grounds of the Palace at Versailles where he pitched his tent outside the city. He remembered the exact statue that “guarded” his tent located on the walkway heading to the reflection pond. His time in Paris during 1944 was short lived as the First Army left for Belgium. He experienced the Battle of the Bulge, was nearly killed by German Shelling in the Hurtzgen Forrest, later went from Liege and experienced the horror of Aachen Germany that was flattened by bombing runs, where that smell was once again everywhere. Was injured by being in a building in Aachen that collapsed during German bombardment. Made it out of Aachen to cross the Ludendorf Bridge at Remagen and into Germany. Near the end of the war, he was at Weimar during the liberation of Buchenwald. This was a work camp, not a death camp, but this is where most of the photos of bodies stacked like cord wood were taken. The smell was there too. I still have his scrap book/some photos, some military souvenirs, and his military map with his journey being documented. It’s hard for me to believe anyone could have been thrown into this at any age, let alone at 19, and was involved in so many strategic locations, and survived. We owe so much to those who have and continue to serve. It saddens me greatly to realize the state our country is now in. My father passed away in 2015. There is not a day that I do not think of him. My dad, my hero.

Sorry for being long in words.

Thank you for starting this D-Day thread.